After leaving Dos Cabezas, Arizona, I timidly checked my brakes several times on the road down a mountain. Then boldly. They seemed to be doing great. I was expecting the pedal to be mushy (indicating air in the system) but they weren’t, they seem fine.
It’s a lonely road so I wasn’t to worried about running into anyone even if the brakes failed. I was planning on stopping in Willcox for supplies before I headed to Mexico, but couldn’t think of anything I needed. So I turned around, took a picture of the mountain that gave Dos Cabezas its name (two heads), and headed back up the hills. This gave me a new road to follow, and it looped back to where I was going anyway so no biggie.
Dos Cabezas: (That pointy double peak in the middle of the picture)
The road down south was pretty old but well maintained. Didn’t have any trouble on the trip. I spent my time driving and reached Bisbee, Arizona around 1:30pm. A quick check at the US side of the boarder in Naco informed me that I wouldn’t have any trouble bringing back into the US my shop equipment or parts.
Then I headed back into Bisbee to spend the night at a campground I’d read about. I wasn’t there at the CG more then 30 minutes and meet an artist who loves Bisbee and volunteered to show me around the place. Bisbee was once the largest city between St. Louis and San Francisco. It was based around a mine that happened to have high grade copper ore during the electric lighting & telephone boom across the US. So, with all those miners, this town was huge. And at 5,000 feet, it has almost perfect year round weather. Back in the ’70’s to ’80’s, the place was a virtual ghost town until some hippy artists found it. You could buy a nearly new, excellent condition, 5000 sq ft house for $3,000! Soon the place was crawling with hippy types, and the place started booming again with all it’s art and history and is now a modern success story. I spent another day here just wandering around looking at the place. Late in the afternoon of the second day, I took the tour into the mine. The original mine started out as a shaft sunk into the hillside, later it became an open pit mine.
Just look at the colors in those hills:
Bisbee proper:
Up the street a little:
One of the many quaint buildings along the street:
The courthouse doors, made in the early ’30s:
One of the numerous old buildings that use to be a brothel:
A view from the campgrounds:
A trip into the original mine:
Here’s where I was, and if I turn around and walk just 100 yards, you can get the picture after:
In the ’30’s the equipment was powerful enough that they could start this:
I love Bisbee! Did you walk down Brewery St? How about visiting the Copper City Brewery (if still there)? I really hope to visit that mine someday, looks neat.
Yes, I was given the tour by a guy from my campground. He was all, ‘Let’s drink here, oh, another place to have a drink!” so I visited each and every open bar on Brewery St. as you call it.
The mine tour is $12, lasts an hour and goes around 1800 feet into the mountain. Kinda neat, but I was hoping that the little train we rode would also go outside and along an edge of the pit mine. It didn’t. In fact they really didn’t say anything about the pit mine.